Greetings from J-List April 7, 2004

Hello from all of us in Japan! We're back safely from our trip to the U.S. We had a great vacation, and really soaked up the sun that San Diego is famous for. It was our ten year wedding anniversary, so my wife and I took a short cruise to Mexico, and really had fun. Now we've returned to Japan, laden with Pop Tarts, Starbuck's coffee, peanut butter and other icons of American life. It's good to be back.

The social phenomenon known as "kogals" -- Japanese valley girls who wear outrageous fashions, with blonde-dyed hair, silly elevator shoes and over-tanned bodies -- was one of the keywords of the late 1990's in Japan. Kogals themselves owe their origins to the fashion-conscious teen movement of the mid 90s called "Amulers," when every high school girl wanted to dress up like JPOP singer Namie Amuro. Now that the former generation of kogals has grown up, every once in a while you come across an interesting phenomenon: "gal mamas," ultra-stylish twentysomethings who got pregnant in their kogal days and are still dressing up in outrageous furs and false eyelashes, even though they're pushing baby carriages now. Seeing two "gals" exchanging child-rearing tips while they put on their thick make-up can be quite a sight, and is a uniquely Japanese experience.

Spring has come to Japan, and all throughout the country, beautiful cherry blossoms are in bloom. Every year we bring out our line of popular Japanese footwear, tatami sandals (called "zori" or "setta" in Japanese) and geta shoes that allow you to wear a little piece of Japan on your feet. We've added many new styles of Japanese sandals, from large sizes for men to stylish hand-sewn tatami shoes for ladies. Enjoy all the great new Japanese shoes we've got for you!

The Japanese believe strongly in talismans to bring good luck, and most Japanese carry a traditional good luck charm, called "omamori" (lit. "protector"), to bring them various forms of good fortune and protect them from harm. We've come up with a cool new item, a wearable good luck charm T-shirt that you can use to bring you good luck, too. Full-size men's shirts and fitted shirts for girls are in stock. Printed with your choice of seven wacky designs:

Ren'ai joju. Increased luck in love and romance.
Jinsei daikichi. General happiness and good luck for your family.
Kin'un appu. An increase in wealth and money fortune.
Zettai goukaku. Success in studying and passing difficult tests.
Housai ganbo. A prayer that you'll find a Japanese wife someday.
Sennyo banrai. A desire to have success finding many women to love.
Shougai otaku. Praying that you'll be an "otaku" forever.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• Shirow Masamune fans, we have a super collector's box for Appleseed, including an official movie book and cool figure inside
  
• Also, enjoy the new photobook of the lovely Chikako Sakuragi, a charming and lovely new sexy idol from Japan
  
• For fans of our delicious Japanese snacks, we've got some fun items, including sweet gummi frogs in the Frog Style line, and chocolate cookies featuring toy mascots of the Nova Bunny, the cute pink rabbit who promotes English conversation in Japan
  
• Also, enjoy tasty Purin Gummi, gummi treats that taste like Japanese caramel flan pudding, and traditional star-shaped hard candy
  
• Restocked snack items include delicious Ramune candy, the famous Felix the Cat strawberry gum (a cult hit around the world), Hello Kitty cookies, and more
  
• Curl is a famous puffed corn snack that's been sold in Japan for decades -- we've got some wacky Curl parody goods, including a plush Curl keychain and an all-purpose key case featuring Uncle Curl
  
• Just in time for the new school year (in Japan anyway), we've got a line of really cool "kneading erasers," gum erasers that you can mold and play with like chewing gum, in many flavors
  
• We love the miniature food replica items from Japan, and have restocked several for you, including Cafe Meals and the best-selling traditional Japanese dishes
  
• For Sanrio fans, we've got a really cool item: an ice cube tray that makes great 3D Hello Kitty ice cubes, great for impressing friends
  
• Also, a really fun Hello Kitty talking portable phone that lets your little one (or you) talk to Kitty herself, and a pack of Kitty playing cards
  
• Fans of the super-cute Hidamari no Tami, we've got a cute new head-rocking pal for you that never needs batteries
  
• Enjoy a new line of detailed anime figurines in the Leaf Collection vol 5, featuring the super cute character of the Leaf universe
  
• Love the super-cute penguin character Pingu? We have a very cute PVC mascot of this world-famous character for you
  
• Panda-Z is a popular cute character line that parodies Go Nagai's famous Mazinger Z mecha show, but with a cute twist -- we've added some great Panda-Z character items for you, including pens, mechanical pencils, and cute pencil cases
  
• Enjoy your time in the bath or shower with a super Japanese goldfish bath sponge, which features a soft side and a rough side to clean your body
  
• Finally, got a happy event you'd like to celebrate? We have birth and "I passed the test" announcements for you, very stylish and very Japanese.

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• For fans of beautiful Japanese women, we have the new issue of Bejean, the oversized magazine that features dozens of famous JAV girls as well as a super-giant poster of Nao Oikawa
  
• Also, a super new photo-magazine featuring Sayaka Isoyama's dynamite sexy
  
• Then we've got the new issue of Hip & Lip, the wonderful magazine that combines H manga with beautiful first-rate erotic photography
  
• Photobook fans, enjoy a dynamite look at Ruka Ogawa's debut offering, featuring her wonderful G cup fantasy poses and top-quality glossy printing
  
• Also, a super gouka-bon format photobook for fans of the genre the Japanese refer to as "New Half"
  
• For our H manga customers, we've got some really excellent new items for you today, including a dynamite comic exploring hermaphroditism, the super new Heroine Insult by Matsuri Aki, and more
  
• We've also posted a big restocking of popular H comics including a dozen back-in-stock items
  
• Also for yaoi collectors, we've got a new issue of Kinniku Otoko (Muscle Men) as well as various restocked manga volumes for you
  
• For our DVD customers, we have a great lineup of titles for you, starting with the very best of Nao Oikawa on the Million label, a dynamite 4 hours of her best work for a great price (region free)
  
• Then see the "Heart Rending Love" of Kasumi Misato's first performance as a JAV starlet, a great new face for you to enjoy (region free)
  
• Japan is famous for "print club" (puri-kura) machines which take your picture and print out stickers of the pictures -- now Soft on Demand boldly creates a new genre for you, "ero-puri" featuring hot kogals off the street (region free)
  
• Momo Takai is a beautiful JAV actress with a girl-next-door face -- see her sayonara production in a new DVD by SOD (region free)
  
• Garo Aida is the premier nude photographer in Japan today -- see his dynamite work on DVD, featuring the lovely Misaki (region free)
  
• Finally, a big restocking of popular DVD titles by Ran Asakawa, Kurumi Morishita, Akira Watase, and "a group of lewd wives who have occupied your house."

Remember that J-List offers revolving subscriptions to some of Japan's most popular magazines, including anime magazines (Animage, Newtype), toy magazines (Hobby Japan), manga magazines (Young Magazine Uppers), and more. Some of these are very cutting edge and cool to read, such as Japanese street fashion magazines Fruits and Egg, and don't forget to check out Megami Magazine, loaded with posters and stickers and other cool things. These magazines will be sent to you as soon as they're available each month, before they're even sent to the newsstands here in Japan, and you can cancel your subscription any time. See the magazine subscription pages for more information.

Greetings from J-List April 2, 2004

Hello again from all of us at J-List!

Despite the fact that Japanese are the longest-lived race (or the 2nd longest lived, depending on the study you read), the Japanese are really big on smoking. 60% of men smoke, and quite a few women, too, which is a little strange to my liberal California way of thinking. Unlike the U.S., where smokers are urged to quit smoking to preserve their health, Japan doesn't have a problem allowing smoking and generating tax revenue from it. For many years the Japanese government operated Japan's largest tobacco company, Japan Tobacco (they also make a line of canned beverages), and although the company has been privatized, it still retains a semi-official status with the government. Because of the great revenues generated from smoking in Japan, there's not much pressure for it to go away at present. Even the "warning label" on cigarettes in Japan is a joke. It reads: "Because there is concern that it will damage your health, please be careful not to smoke too much." People here don't seem very sensitive about it: it's still not uncommon for restaurants to not even have a non-smoking section, yet my wife and I seem to be the only ones who think this is odd. Sadly, as tobacco companies have run into more barriers selling their products in the U.S., they've increased their advertising and overall presence in Japan. All U.S. brands are very well known in Japan, from Camels to Marlboro to Kool. As in the U.S., they don't allow cigarette advertising on TV in Japan, however when you go to some movie theatres you should be prepared to see a huge in-your-face ad for some tobacco product or another before the show starts. It's not something we're used to seeing in the U.S.

It's time for more wacky trivia from the Fountain of Trivia, our favorite Japanese TV show. The colorful wrappers on Chupa-Chups were designed by Salvador Dali. The Playboy bunny logo was chosen because rabbits are famous for their sexual appetites (makes sense, really). Pulling a nose hair will cause tears to form in the eye on the same side of your face as the hair you pulled. Tokyo Tower was constructed using the iron smelted from 90 U.S. tanks left over from the Korean War which the Japanese government bought from the U.S.. If you give coffee to a spider, it will weave a crooked web, as if drunk.

There's a wacky thing that Japanese do to money: fold a 1000 yen bill so that Souseki Natsume (the 19th century novelist who adorns the Japanese 1000 yen note) makes sad or happy faces, depending on which way you look at the bill. I'll teach you how it's done so you can amaze your friends with this great Japanese trick. First, take a bill and make an outward fold where each of his eyes are. Make an inward fold through the middle of his face, so that his eyes are higher than his nose (like little mountains). If you look at the bill from above, the face will look sad; from below, and he'll look happy. Virtually all Japanese known this silly trick, and would be surprised if any non-Japanese knew it. Here's an example of what it'll look like when you're done: http://www.jlist.com/1000.html . If you don't have any Japanese money lying around, it should work pretty much the same with other bills, too. These bills might be disappearing soon though: in April, a new bill featuring Hideo Noguchi, a famous Japanese biologist, will be issued.

We've got another great selection of all-new Japanese products for you, courtesy of the hardworking J-List staff. Enjoy various new manga, DVDs, anime and character items, cool Sanrio items sold only in Japan, and many more cool items!

J-List customers tell us that the #1 way they hear about J-List is through word-of-mouth. We're very glad to hear this, and we're always happy to accept referrals! If you've got a friend who might be interested in our unique brand of Japanese pop culture, why not tell them about J-List, or ask them to sign up to our J-List updates? Thanks!

Greetings from J-List March 31, 2004

Hello again from J-List. It's time for another slice of life from your friends in Japan.

The Japanese name registry (koseki) is an interesting creation. Basically, every city, town or village keeps in its official records a listing of all the families that live in its borders, as an official registry of the population. When a woman gets married, she moves her name from her family's registry to her husband's, taking her husband's last name and effectively becoming a part of that family permanently. The reverse works too: often, when a man moves in with his wife's family, he takes her last name (my father-in-law did this). The registry system was first enacted in 645 AD, although the modern system dates from 1871.

There are some inflexible aspects to the registry system. For one thing, Japanese couples are still forbidden by Japanese law to take separate last names -- they much both legally take either the husband or the wife's last name. No doubt there is some sexism involved, but the bigger reason is probably because they don't want this neat system that tracks every single Japanese citizen to get messed up. The other issue is foreigners: because we're not Japanese citizens, our existence isn't listed on the family's official registry, except occasionally in a comments field. This leads to some embarrassing problems: once a child welfare employee was dispatched to our house to check up on what they thought was a poor single mother and her two children.

The concept of the family registry is closely tied to the family's grave -- there's one large gravestone for each family, and to be part of a certain family means that you are interred inside there when you die. Our own family grave is located near our home, in one of many graveyards that dot rural Japan. Near the vernal and autumnal equinoxes, there are special memorial days called Ohigan (the o- is the honorific prefix that is used with many Buddhist terms), when the spirits of the departed come home for a visit. During this time, it's customary to go visit the family grave, wash it with clean water, burn incense, and arrange special flowers for the dead, which you can buy these at 7-11. Ohigan are solemn Buddhist events in the Japanese calendar, but the most important Buddhist holiday are Obon, usually July 13-16, another time when the dead come home to spend some time for the living. During this time, many people return to their parents homes to visit (like Thanksgiving in the U.S.).

For the new update, the capable J-List staff has put together another top-notch selection of DVDs, toys, snacks, household items and other wacky items from Japan. Please browse the new items on the J-List and JBOX.com sites. We hope we can serve you in some way!

Remember that J-List carries excellent magazine by our "reserve subscription." This means that you can get great anime, JPOP, fashion and other magazines sent to you as soon as the new issue is out in Japan -- a few days earlier than newsstands receive them here, in fact. Two of the most popular items we make available are FRUiTS, the fabulous magazine of Tokyo street culture, and Megami Magazine, a gorgeous anime magazine that seems bent on giving away so many anime posters and other cool freebees that they lose money on every issue. Payment through any method is fine (credit card, check or money order, etc) and you can stop your subscription at any time.

Greetings from J-List March 29, 2004

Hello again from all of us at J-List.

Well, I'm off on another adventure in the U.S. The Japanese school year ends in March in Japan, and we're taking advantage of the break to have a little vacation in America. We'll be leaving the kids with their grandmother and taking some time for ourselves: it's our 10 year wedding anniversary, so we're going on a cruise to Mexico. While we're gone, the competent J-List staff will make sure everything goes smoothly in our absence. We hope we can serve you!

There's no doubt about it -- the Japanese really love their tea. While in a 7-11 recently, I counted no less than two dozen brands of bottled or canned tea for sale, mostly variations on Japanese green tea and Chinese oolong tea. In addition to the normal Western canned tea like Kirin's Afternoon Tea, which are the only teas with sugar added, many brands competed for shelf space, including Kirin's Nama-cha (lit. "fresh tea"), Sapporo's Kyo-ryoku-cha (Kyoto-style green tea), Asahi's Marocha ("mild tea"), the popular Soukenbi-cha blended tea by Coca-cola, and various blends of jasmine tea. The latest fashion in bottled tea are healthy teas like Healthia, which contains beneficial bacteria and flavonoids that reduce blood sugar. As the market for bottled tea products heats up, manufacturers come up with ways to get you to buy their products, offering larger or smaller packages, keychains that you get free with the bottle of tea, or TV commercials with top stars like actress Nanako Matsushima. Unlike the U.S., where adding sweetener to products is a requirement in most cases, all Asian teas are completely unsweetened, and the unaltered, slightly bitter taste is really delicious. As summer draws near, we'll offer an old favorite at J-List: cold-water tea bags to make delicious Japanese mugi-cha, barley tea, a popular drink in the hot months.

One of the entries on the "You've been in Japan too long when..." list on my personal homepage is, "You've been in Japan too long when you have a favorite bush to pee behind." For some strange reason, Japanese men have a great tendency to urinate out of doors. When taking a drive somewhere, it's not at all uncommon to see an older Japanese man peeing by the side of the road, and while walking to J-List from my house, all of 300 feet away, I often run into one of our neighbors going into a ditch. The word for peeing outside is "tachi-shon" (standing-peeing). Tokyo people say that city-dwellers don't relieve themselves in this way, only people living in the "inaka" (the boondocks) do, but I've seen it done in Tokyo and Yokohama, so I have my doubts. The problem is so bad that you can actually see signs posted here and there proclaiming "It is forbidden to urinate here" (shouben kinshi). It was so wacky that we made a J-List T-shirt of this bizarre sign for you to wear.

For the new update, we've got a great new volley of new products for you, with everything from new snacks to photobooks to magazines to anime items and toys. Please check out all the great new items!

Remember that J-List sells delicious chewing gum from Japan, with many uniquely Japanese varieties available -- Black Black spicy caffeine gum (a cult favorite all around the world, written up in Wired), Lotte's Ume (plum) flavored gum, Sweetie (grapefruit), and the delicious thirst-quenching Dakara (very similar in taste to Pocari Sweat). Remember, if you buy 10 or more packs of Japanese gum, you get a 15% discount, too.

Greetings from J-List March 26, 2004

Hello and TGIF from your friends in Japan!

Japanese study English, but there's always a subtle conflict that no one acknowledges: do they study American English or British English? The Japanese have always had great respect for England, and have patterned much of their government after the U.K. Still, the Japanese tend to study American spelling ("color" not "colour") and pronunciation, as a general rule, because of the long influence of the postwar occupation and Hollywood movies. The problem is, it's not a fixed rule -- British English is sometimes used in schools, just enough to confuse the poor kids. When my wife was in Junior High school, she took part in a pronunciation contest. She practiced and practiced the text she was supposed to read, but unfortunately, the teacher who helped her with the material had learned British English, and the two accents confused her terribly.

Proper names are also notoriously difficult to read in Japanese. My wife's family's last name, Yanai, is read as "Yanagi" or "Yauchi" in almost every other part of Japan besides our city, and sometimes people in out city can't read our last name, despite the fact that the mayor has the same last name as us (we're distantly related, I think). Place names can be difficult for Japanese to read, unless they happened to grow up in that area. All the place names in Northern Japan, which was inhabited by the indigenous Ainu people for thousands of years, have odd names can't be written with standard characters -- and as a result, most Japanese often can't read the names.

Studying the names of Japanese companies can be interesting. For example, I'll bet you never knew that Kyocera is short for "Kyoto Ceramics." The number one car company in Japan is Toyota, which is located in Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture (near Nagoya) -- but the company came first, and the city changed its name to Toyota City in 1959 "to reflect its bright prospects to develop and prosper as an automobile city." The number two Japanese car company is Honda, founded by Soichiro Honda to make motorcycles after the end of World War II. Mazda, which is more than half owned by Ford now, is really called Matsuda in Japan, but they came up with the name Mazda so they could sound less Japanese in foreign markets. Datsun's name has an interesting story -- DAT were the first letters of the names of three founders, and they considered the company they were founding to be their son, thus DATSON. However, "son" (with a long vowel, so that it rhymes with bone), means "loss" or "disadvantage" in Japanese, so they changed it to "sun," a much more cheerful word. Datsun was later bought out by one of its distributors, Nissan (which means "Made in Japan" -- if you said "America-san" it would be "made in America"). Subaru, based near J-List, is the Japanese name for the star cluster we called the Pleiades. Some popular beer companies are Asahi ("morning sun"), Kirin (named after a magical Chinese dragon), and Suntory (the president's name as Tori-san, so he reversed it to come up with the name of his company). Other interesting names are Daihatsu ("Osaka Engineering Tools"), Pocky manufacturer Glico (which gets its name from the word "glycogen"), and Bridgestone (named after its founder, Mr. Ishibashi, which means "stone bridge").

For the new update, we've got a great new volley of new products for you, with everything from new snacks to photobooks to magazines to anime items and toys. Please check out all the great new items!

Remember that J-List offers a huge selection of cool toys from Japan, which are usually sold in the Japanese marketplace and not available outside of Japan. From Japan-market Hot Wheels to Kubrick toys and high-quality soft vinyl anime figures, we've got some really cool stuff for your collection.

Greetings from J-List March 19, 2004

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Greetings from J-List March 15, 2004

Hello from Japan, where a corn dog is known as an "American Dog."

Starbucks continues their expansion in Japan, bringing their upbeat coffee and other beverages to all corners of the country. Most popular areas of Tokyo have several Starbucks, and it's still quite common to find branches with no empty seats -- so Japanese, who are used to crowds, drink their coffee while standing up. It's interesting to compare the menus in Japan and the U.S. The Japanese have no love of eggnog, and so I never get to enjoy eggnog lattes around Christmas time. However, Starbucks Japan offers local variations for their Japanese customers, such as this month's special, White Chocolate Mocha, offered because March 14 is White Day, the day when men who received chocolate from women on Valentine's Day are supposed to give something back. Matcha Frappachinos are also very good, and especially refreshing in the summer.

There are many interesting service-related customs in Japan that I think would work well in other countries, too. In most Japanese restaurants, waitresses give you a steaming hot towel to clean your hands (or if you're a little ill-mannered, your face). Similar to the hot towels they hand out in airplanes, the steamed towels are just the ticket to make customers feel pampered and positive about the meal they're about to enjoy. Another interesting custom are radio-controlled call buttons on tables, which you press to let your server know you'd like to order. Like the men's urinals that automatically flush when a patron walks away, which originated in Japan, these handy amenities might be appreciated by customers in other countries, too. Another Japanese innovation I've watched for a long time: Japanese taxi companies called "dai-sha" ("replacement car"). If you've had too much to drink at a bar, call one of these special taxis, which have two people inside: one to drive you home in the taxi, and a second to drive your car home, so you don't have to leave it at the bar.

The Star Trek replica models from Furuta are off to a great start, which makes us happy, since these highly detailed toys are really the coolest thing we've seen in a long time (I've got my set on display). Meticulously crafted replicas of all the famous Star Trek ships, the detail is so fine you can read tiny words on the ships in the most unlikely places. They're sturdy, assemble easily, and come with stands for displaying.

Greetings from J-List March 10, 2004

Hello again from all of us in Japan!

When you become bilingual in a language, you learn a lot about how your own brain works, such what actually goes on inside your head when you learn a new vocabulary words. Every act of learning involves a physical change in your brain, the creation of a new synapse from one cell to another, and sometimes it seems you can feel this at work in your head. It makes you think about the nature of language in general and wonder about your own native language in the process. The "mystery of translation" is also fascinating: the act of translating from one language to another takes place deep inside your brain, on a level below your conscious thoughts, like a process in a computer that's running in the background. You place some English in the "buffer," and then something happens in your brain, and in a few seconds Japanese is waiting for you to retrieve it from your internal cache. You can almost hear the "ding" in your mind as the translation "cooks" and is done, without any conscious awareness.

When it comes to translation, though, there's one direction to go: from your second language to your native language. If I'm translating from Japanese to English, I'll be able to do it just fine, since my mother tongue is English; but woe is me if I try to translate in the other direction. I know this because I tried it once. My father, who was a nautical engineer making advanced hydrofoils, had to get a patent of his translated into Japanese, so he asked his Japanophile son to do the translation for him. Wanting to impress my Dad, I agreed, and two months of intense labor later, I had produced what had to be the most tear-jerkingly hilarious patent translation ever seen in Japan. I learned my lesson and now politely refuse any requests for translations into Japanese. I believe that 90% of the "wasei eigo" (literally "made in Japan English"), the silly Engrish words the Japanese are so good at coming up with, are inadvertently created by Japanese who've been asked to translate in the wrong direction.

Soy sauce is a popular flavoring in Japan, and is used more often than salt and pepper to improve the flavor of food here -- I realized the other day that my wife doesn't even keep salt and pepper in our kitchen since she never uses them. Another popular sauce used by the Japanese goes by the descriptive name of "sauce" (sou-su, although it's officially known as tonkatsu sauce). It's a delicious thick sauce that compliments many kinds of foods, especially fried food like potato croquettes. Both soy sauce and tonkatsu sauce are sometimes poured over eggs in Japan, and a debate has raged for years at J-List as to which tastes better. Personally, I think nothing improves fried eggs than a dabble of Kikkoman soy sauce, but apparently I am in the minority, as most of the other J-List staff favor the thicker tonkatsu sauce on their eggs. In case you're interested in making the same comparison, we've gotten Bulldog's delicious tonkatsu sauce in stock on the site for you.

We had a slight problem with the "R" side of the site after the last update. The three-day link on the main page pointed to the "PG" products, which may have caused some confusion for some customers. Sorry for the problem (it's been fixed).

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, we love unique and cute things from Japan, and we've added many of the super-cute Hidamari no Tami and Hanauta no Tami cute relaxing toys, figures who move their heads back and forth while they relax you
  
• Then enjoy a wonderful photobook for Miho Yoshioka fans, the excellent Novel, filled with breathtakingly beautiful pictures of Japan's top Race Queen
  
• Norika Fujiwara is another fabulous Japanese actress and idol -- see her hardcover photobook shot in Kenya!
  
• We've restocked other art books and photobooks, including Yuko Ogura's so-cute pinup poster book, the Race Queen Hundred Costume Catalog, Morning Musume's Rika Ishikawa, and more
  
• Hungry for something cute? The "Nyanko restaurant" series by San-X continues, this time in the form of super cute hamburger and hotdog plush toys that contain little cats
  
• Ojamajo Doremi was the most recent Japanese "witch" anime for girls, and we loved the show -- for fans, we have full sets of gashapon capsule toys from the show
  
• For fans of our Japanese snacks, we have some great items, including a new variety of miniature pizza crackers, delicious "petite raspberry tarts," and tasty edamame snack treats
  
• Hello Kitty fans, J-List always carries great items for you sold only in Japan -- see a cool Hello Kitty band-aid set complete with carrying case
  
• We've also restocked the cute Kitty plush towel holder and towels (both colors), the Kitty Pachinko machine (one of my favorite items), and the popular Kitty "kigurumi" full face mask
  
• Also, look for fresh stock of some great parody items, including toilet paper that helps you learn Japanese, funny headbands for your head, and the best-selling tattoo shirt which makes you look like a yakuza with a full-body tattoo
  
• Sesame seeds are all the rage in Japan because they promote health in many ways -- we've got a handy sesame seed grating device for your kitchen
  
• Studying Japanese? We've got cute little soft puzzles with all the Japanese prefectures you can put together, very neat
  
• Also great for your kitchen, an affordable new bento box from Japan, just for you
  
• For fans of Lucky Cat, the famous waving cat who is actually inviting business and financial success into your life, we've got some cool Lucky Cat piggy banks in stock for you
  
• Totoro and Studio Ghibli fans, we've restocked many popular plush toys, including the Bou Nezumi and No Face keychains, the cool Ghibli Plush Keychain set, and various Totoro toys
  
• Finally, we've got a really cool way to give coffee and cream to your guest, portable Go that you can play anywhere, a funky leopard costume, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• For fans of Japan's great 18+ magazines, we've got the new issue of Shuffle, featuring lovely girls in Japanese love hotels
  
• For photobook fans, we've got the dynamite new offering of Naho Ozawa, which will knock all your socks off
  
• Then enjoy a wonderful photobook for Miho Yoshioka fans, the excellent Novel, filled with breathtakingly beautiful pictures of Japan's top Race Queen
  
• Tokyo Alice is a fabulous photobook by Akio Nakamori capturing some of the most startling and bold cosplay images we've seen in a long time
  
• We've also restocked many popular photobooks, including Kyoko Ayana's lovely Blue Shot
  
• For fans of all things bishoujo, we've got the new issue of Push in stock, filled with the most up-to-date game information in Japan
  
• We've got some excellent new manga in stock for you too, including an excellent work about first experience by Mejiro Tsugumi, a super cosplay and catgirl manga, and the elegant artwork of "The Body Which Loves One"
  
• Also, a great restocking of popular manga comics for you, including the last-ever stock of the popular Spirit of Capitalism, and many other volumes
  
• J-List carries toys for adults that are very unique, because they're designed and sold in the Japanese market exclusively -- see two great items we've added for you, including a massager designed by a medical research company
  
• Also, we've restocked some of our most popular items, including the Rabbit Rotor, the large-size Hello Kitty deluxe massager, Ai in a Cup, Mr. Pink, and Japanese parody condoms
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some dynamite titles for you, starting with the delightful debut on the Million label of Mami Yasuhara, a fresh and new JAV idol (region free)
  
• Then experience a whopping 8 hours of wonderful performances by the beautiful Nao Oikawa, in a great new DVD release by Million (region free)
  
• Hitomi Hayasaka is one of the most vibrant and alive stars in Japan's professional video world -- see her in a great new "4p" release that shows you the "soap technique of Hitomi" (region free)
  
• Japan men just love female newscasters and TV announcers -- see the very best of SOD's newscaster moments in a new release for you -- very cool (region free)
  
• Then, Ran Monbu is a super heroine who defends justice and fights evil in a new release by SOD's IEnergy label -- a great parody on Power Rangers (region free)
  
• From Moodyz, enjoy the Double Fantasy of Kirari Koizumi and Rina Takase, a great 2-disc selection that explores the back doors of beautiful stars (region 2)
  
• Look for many restocked DVD titles, too, including the low-priced Masterpiece Concentration, the Cosplay Perfection Speciel Edition, Ami Ayukawa's excellent indies releases, and more all-girl DVD titles.
  

Look for many restocked DVD titles, too, including the low-priced Masterpiece Concentration

Remember that J-List's wacky Japanese T-shirts are a fun way to wrap yourself in an esoteric Japanese message and broadcast your love of Japan to others. Our shirts are all 100% cotton and of very high quality, with silkscreened printing that will last for many years. J-List goes the extra distance for you too, offering sizes from small all the way up to 3XL for most shirts. Order 3 or more shirts and get 10% off, too!

Greetings from J-List March 5, 2004

Hello and TGIF from all of us in Japan!

Part of the fun of living in Japan is watching Japanese TV, which never fails to entertain. One of the most popular TV shows on right now is Toribia no Izumi, or the Fountain of Trivia, which presents fun but useless trivia to a panel of famous Japanese comedians and entertainers, who then press buttons to indicate how interesting they think the trivia item is. Some of my favorites: In Angkor Wat, there's a pillar with graffiti written by a samurai who went there in the 1700's, thinking it was a Buddhist temple. After the 15th Tokugawa Shogun returned power to the emperor in the Meiji Restoration, he tried to find work as a photographer. In the Japan Lion's Club, the members affix the word "lion" to the end of their names. The original rules for organized basketball called for two teams of 50 players each. In the original Italian story that Cinderella was based on, Cinderella slams a chest on her stepmother, killing her. They also answer such useless questions as, how much faster would an Olympic sprinter be able to run if he were running on a moving sidewalk.

Another show we like to watch is TV Champion, which pits contestants against each other to show off their amazing talents, creating massive origami sculptures, remodeling hundred year old homes with limited budgets, baking exotic cakes, and so on. Some shows feature eating contests to see how many hot dogs, bananas or sushi contestants can eat in a limited time. Yesterday they featured artists who made amazing sculptures out of massive blocks of styrofoam. One contestant recreated an Egyptian tomb, complete with pillars and skeletons, all carved and painted with simple tools. Another interesting creation was the lunar surface, complete with styrofoam replicas of Neil Armstrong and the lunar lander.

Today is Friday, and that means I'll be taking the kids to our favorite public bath. Bathing in hot springs ("onsen") and public baths ("sento") is a popular pasttime in Japan, and despite the hard economic times of the past few years, Japan's public bathing sector has been going strong. Our favorite bath is called Yura no Sato, and offers over a dozen different baths to enjoy, from traditional Japanese "kama" baths which are basically giant metal pots to baths with rocks on the bottom which massage your feet.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for fans of really cute things from Japan, we've got a new USB "hubcot" (hub mascot) featuring Sony's cute cat Doko Demo Issyo ("Always With You")
  
• J-List loves the miniature toys from Japan, called candy toys because you usually get some candy included with the toy -- we've got some nifty cases that are great for displaying your small toys proudly in your room
  
• Speaking of candy toys, we've got a super cool item in stock, a replica of famous bottles of sake, with delicious replicas of food you eat in Japanese bars
  
• Also very cool, we've got limited stock of full sets of the new Please Teacher Collection Figure -- get all six before they're gone
  
• We have some great new snack items for you, including delicious Lotte Cheesecake Toppo, a baked stick snack with "cheesecake choco" inside
  
• Also newly posted, find Nestle's Aero Choco, delicious whipped chocolate to eat, tasty garlic bread snacks, Every Burger (chocolate hamburger cookies), and for fans of Japanese bubble gum, new yogurt flavored Fruit of the Bubble
  
• We've made a great big restocking of our snack items to better serve you -- look for Coconut Pocky, delicious little cheesecake snacks, Shrimp & Salt flavored Pretz, and fresh stock of sugarless Black Black
  
• We've got some really cool household items from Japan, including soft rubber bumpers which protect your little ones from bumping on corners, a handy toothbrush hanger for your bathroom, and more
  
• Newly added items for your kitchen including a great hard-boiled egg cutter, which slices into pieces in one movement, and a new non-stick scoop for your rice cooker
  
• Enjoy more classical music of old Japan with new CDs we've posted -- including Japanese military songs from World War II
  
• The hibiscus flower is the symbol of young Japanese females, called kogals, and we've got a great reflective hibiscus sticker in stock for you
  
• Finally, look for more Tomica die-cast metal cars and other restocked toys on the site.
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• For fans of the excellent 18+ magazines from Japan, we've got the new issue of Gokuh, filled with beautiful women (including Sola Aoi, one of our favorites) and a giant pull-out poster
  
• Then we've got the very cool issue of Ultimate Heroine, a beautiful look a leather lingerie from Sanwa
  
• For photobook aficionados, be sure to check out the new Temption Blue, featuring the drop-dead gorgeous Aki Hoshino (comes with a DVD!)
  
• Also, we've got a fabulous photobook capturing the up-close and personal photographs of Kyoko Ayana, one of Japan's top names in the JAV world today
  
• For fans of detailed ropework and other themes, we've got the new issue of DVD Aido Club, which features a full color magazine and a DVD full of great movies to sample
  
• For our manga customers, we've got more excellent works for you, including the lovely "I want to be gently held by you" by EC Comics, and a superb anthology of various cosplay themes
  
• We have some great new doujinshi for collectors of these popular parody books, all brand new releases in Japan
  
• Also, we've got a fabulous collection of doujin CG by the doujin circle Mimakasa Direct
  
• We love to bring you really cool toys for adults that can only be found in Japan -- we've got two new blow-up "love pillows" of real Japanese actresses, which come complete with vocal CDs by the girls -- wow
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some great items for the weekend update -- first up, Million asks the question "What If Asuka Sawaguchi Were my Dearest Girl..." (region free)
  
• We have a veritable festival for Minori Aoi fans -- three of her best titles re-released at great prices. Buy them separately, or as part of a new Minori Aoi Complete Box set (region free)
  
• Then enjoy more of the pure loveliness of Nana Natsume in a new image video release by Soft on Demand (region free)
  
• Also from SOD, we've got a really interesting twist on yaoi -- a work which explores themes of homosexuality, yet both of the performers are women pretending to be men (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the Best oif Madoka Ozawa brought to you by Moodyz, 4 hours of her best performances on two DVDs (region 2)
  
• Finally, we've also got a major restocking of DVDs for you, including Stewardess and Leg Best 4 Hours, Marina Matsushima's excellent "DIX," Cosplay & Tekoki, Mika Kitagawa's elegant performances, Haruka Tsukino Final, and more great works by Sola Aoi and Ran Asakura.
  

Remember that J-List sells delicious stick snacks from Japan, including the delicious chocolate covered Pocky (Coconut is one of my favorite flavors), salty and delicious Pretz (I love the Tomato and Grilled Corn flavors), and the baked Toppo. Since the summer months in Japan are very hot and humid, we don't sell any products with chocolate past May or so. If you're looking to try our great selection of delicious stitch snacks, hurry!

Greetings from J-List March 3, 2004

Hello again from all of us in Japan!

It's official: as of 2003, there are more drivers on Japanese roads aged 65 or older than young drivers aged 18-24, with the oldest licensed driver in Japan a hale 104. The aging of Japan continues, brought on by one of the lowest birthrates of any industrialized country (1.33 babies born per female) and the lack of immigration. As the population gets older, companies are moving to create products and services for them. It seems every third TV commercial on daytime television is for companies selling products for older Japanese, including ways to remodel your house and make it "barrier free," a term the Japanese have coined meaning a living space that's free of stairs and other obstacles that make it hard to live. Diapers for adults are also advertised openly on TV. Insurance companies like Zurich and AFLAC have found a profitable business in Japan, selling supplemental insurance to elderly Japanese who worry about being hospitalized and not having enough insurance to cover the costs.

Written Japanese can be quite confusing. In general, kanji characters in Japanese have two readings, a Japanese reading and a Chinese one (there are many exceptions to this rule). Because there are two ways to pronounce most characters, there is often confusion about which pronunciation is "official" in a given situation. The character for mountain is read with the Japanese reading of "yama," but paired with the names of mountains, you usually use the Chinese reading of "san": hence, the name of Mt. Fuji in Japanese should be Fuji-san and not Fuji-yama. However, there are parts of Japan that do use Fuji-yama for the official name, for no reason that I can fathom other than regional dialect differences. Similarly, our favorite soba restaurant is a local place called Soba-gura (literally "soba warehouse"). But the character for warehouse can also be read "zo," and to this day I'm not really sure if the restaurant I've been going to for years is called Soba-gura of Soba-zo.

Japan is a great place, far ahead of the rest of the world in such important cultural areas as cellular phones, stylish refrigerators with doors that open either from the left or the right, toilet seats that wash your butt (and dry it), and wonderful massage chairs that bathe you in negative ions as you get massaged. But there are some areas where Japan lags behind the rest of the world. Japanese clothes dryers all lack vents leading to the outside of your house, creating unpleasant humidity while your clothes are being dried. Japan has many choices for good ethnic eating, but Mexican isn't something the Japanese ever developed a taste for -- no chips or salsa here. Bagels are also an alien thing to the Japanese, and are very hard to find. And Japanese peanut butter is, well, so over-sweetened that no American could be happy eating it. So I make sure to bring back a couple jars of Peter Pan every time I go back to the States.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for fans of unique Japanese toys you can't find outside of Japan, we've got a series of Japanese Zero fighters, a great replica series by Doyusha
  
• Hello Kitty fans, we have a cool CD case that you will flip over, sold only in Japan
  
• We have unique snack items for you today, including Morinaga Bake (baked chocolate snacks), more Petite Snack tube treats, and candy featuring the famous (in Japan) Nova Bunny, from Nova's English conversation school commercials
  
• Also, we have more delicious Pocky snacks with traditional flavors from Kyoto -- the newest flavor is yomogi, a delicious taste from old Japan
  
• We've also restocked several candy and snack items, including Strawberry Kit Kat and the
  
• J-List lives to bring cool things from Japan to you all -- one such item is the Morino Ichigo figure from Please Teacher, a beautiful soft vinyl anime statue with base that looks great
  
• Morning Musume's Natsube Abe (AH-beh) is one of the most popular members of the popular group - see her fabulous new photobook which captures amazing Japanese imagery along with the beauty of this delightful idol
  
• Also look for various restocked photobooks, including popular swimsuit idols like Yuko Ogura, Moe Yoshizawa and Yoko Matsugane
  
• Also, for fans of our dynamite custom-made high school uniforms, hand-crafted to your size specifications by Matsukameya of Nagoya, we've gotten in stock of the leather Japanese school bag and the 70 cm authentic loose socks
  
• Inuyasha fans, we've got a great new trading card series by Cardass in stock for you
  
• Fans of Zeta Gundam (my personal favorite), we have soft vinyl keychains of the Qubeley and Psycho Gundam, with Hamaan Kahn and Four -- so cool!
  
• Then enjoy the delightful sexy photos of Kasumi Nakane, in a great new photobook for all fans of beautiful women
  
• We have more wacky signs from Japan, including authentic "emergency exit" signs and other wacky things for your room
  
• We have more wacky Japanese chopsticks in stylish colors for your home
  
• For fans of Japan's wacky parody erasers, we've got cute erasers in the shapes of boxes of tissues and toilet paper
  
• We've gotten our hands on more sets of the Spirit of Wonder full set + rare figure toys, for collectors who want to get this really nice
  
• The popular Tomica Prius die-cast car replica has been restocked, for anyone who wants to own a mini version of this popular car
  
• Finally, look for Japanese hot spring bath powder, fresh stock of our popular miniature Japanese food, restocked items for your kitchen, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• For fans of 18+ magazines, we have the elegant new Urecco, a great issue that's filled with incredibly beautiful stars for you to check out
  
• Also, several new magazines featuring real Tokyo girls in authentic love hotels
  
• Photobook fans, we've got another great photobook with Sola Aoi, aka Sora Aoi, a fabulous new hardcover offering for the stylish photography what we've come to call "Japanese girls in Underoos"
  
• We've restocked several of the Encyclopedia of High School Girls Uniform photobooks, who those who love the aesthetic look of Japan's uniforms, or who want to recreate them for cosplay
  
• Also, look for other restocked photobook items, including books by Mayu Koizumi, Moe Yoshizawa and Sola Aoi
  
• For 18+ manga fans and collectors, we've got some great new books for you, including Mellow by MD Comics, a collection of manga works by popular female manga artists, and a new installment of the popular Please Older Sister series
  
• Yaoi fans, we have a new issue of the popular Muscle Men, along with freshly restocked yaoi comics for you
  
• We've got another volley of great doujinshi, including an ultra-thick uber-doujinshi/manga with 250+ pages of fantastic art
  
• DVD fans, we've got some great items for you, starting with a collection of outdoor naughtiness in the streets, subways and parks of Tokyo (region free)
  
• Then enjoy a superb new release by one of our favorite JAV stars, Kyoko Ayana, so bright and happy and soft like a cloud (region free)
  
• Izumi Hasegawa is a dynamite JAV star, performing for the first time in indies works -- see her excellent debut work by Soft on Demand (region free)
  
• Then from the creators of Deep Kiss, we have a great new release, Massaging Breasts for the First Time, in which beautiful women get a great massage on camera (region free)
  
• For fans of Bunko Kanazawa, one of the most popular JAV idols of the past decade, we have a new "For the Best Onanie of You" release, complete with a latex toy made from a cast of Bunko's body (region 2)
  
• Finally, we've got a large number of restocked DVD titles, including the smash-hit adult debut of Mai Hagiwara, Kyoko Ayana's delightful onanie assistance, more popular "CFNM" teasing fun, and fresh stock of the Best 4 Hours of the Dream Woman series.
  

Remember that J-List carries dozens of super cool "candy toy" (miniature toys that usually come with candy inside, called "shokugan" in Japanese) items from Japan, including miniature Japanese food items that are replicas of the wax food used to show customers what meals look like in restaurants before they buy. Although these are sold in random boxes, J-List goes the extra mile for you by creating full sets of these great toys for you to buy, without wasting your money on duplicates. All the popular food replicas by Rement are currently out of production, so our current stock of great items such as Family Restaurant and Japanese Desserts and the super cool miniature Japanese supermarket items (complete with shopping basket and receipt) will be all we'll be getting in!

Greetings from J-List March 3, 2004

Hello again from all of us in Japan!

It's official: as of 2003, there are more drivers on Japanese roads aged 65 or older than young drivers aged 18-24, with the oldest licensed driver in Japan a hale 104. The aging of Japan continues, brought on by one of the lowest birthrates of any industrialized country (1.33 babies born per female) and the lack of immigration. As the population gets older, companies are moving to create products and services for them. It seems every third TV commercial on daytime television is for companies selling products for older Japanese, including ways to remodel your house and make it "barrier free," a term the Japanese have coined meaning a living space that's free of stairs and other obstacles that make it hard for the elderly or disabled to live. Diapers for adults and hair-loss products, including those for women, are also advertised openly on TV. Insurance companies like Zurich and AFLAC have found a profitable business in Japan, selling supplemental insurance to elderly Japanese who worry about being hospitalized and not having enough insurance to cover the costs.

Written Japanese can be quite confusing. In general, kanji characters in Japanese have two readings, a Japanese reading and a Chinese one (there are many exceptions to this rule). Because there are two ways to pronounce most characters, there is often confusion about which pronunciation is "official" in a given situation. The character for mountain is read with the Japanese reading of "yama," but paired with the names of mountains, you usually use the Chinese reading of "san": hence, the name of Mt. Fuji in Japanese should be Fuji-san and not Fuji-yama. However, there are parts of Japan that do use Fuji-yama for the official name, for no reason that I can fathom other than regional dialect differences. Similarly, our favorite soba restaurant is a local place called Soba-gura (literally "soba warehouse"). But the character for warehouse can also be read "zo," and to this day I'm not really sure if the restaurant I've been going to for years is called Soba-gura of Soba-zo.

Japan is a great place, far ahead of the rest of the world in such important cultural areas as cellular phones, stylish refrigerators with doors that open either from the left or the right, toilet seats that wash your butt (and dry it), and wonderful massage chairs that bathe you in negative ions as you get massaged. But there are some areas where Japan lags behind the rest of the world. Japanese clothes dryers all lack vents leading to the outside of your house, creating unpleasant humidity while your clothes are being dried. Japan has many choices for good ethnic eating, but Mexican isn't something the Japanese ever developed a taste for -- no chips or salsa here. Bagels are also an alien thing to the Japanese, and are very hard to find. And Japanese peanut butter is, well, so over-sweetened that no American could be happy eating it. So I make sure to bring back a couple jars of Peter Pan every time I go back to the States.

Greetings from J-List February 25, 2004

Hello again from your friends in Japan!

Ask any gaijin living in Japan about dentists here, and you'll be sure to hear some complaints. While Japanese dentists are good at fixing teeth, they're famous for making you come back 24 times to finish your dental work, instead of getting it out of the way in a few visits. There was a TV show on a couple of years ago called "People of Japan! This is Strange," in which Japanese-bilingual foreigners would discuss what kinds of frustrations they experienced living in Japan, and sure enough, Japanese dentists who take months to fix your teeth was brought up several times. I'm in the middle of some major dental work right now, and had a tooth pulled yesterday -- never a fun experience no matter what country you live in. My dentist said that it was very hard to get the tooth out, and he praised by "strong American bones" which were more sturdy than those of his Japanese patients.

Although cities like Tokyo have excellent train and subway systems, in most parts of Japan the only way to get around is a good old car. Buying a car in Japan is a little different from the U.S. though. For starters, there are almost no independent new car dealers, and virtually all new cars are sold through retail locations operated directly by Japan's auto makers. You never drive away with a car the day you go in to buy it, but instead order it, and it's then made to your specifications at the factory and delivered three weeks later. The idea of driving home with your car the day you buy it would rob drivers of part of the fun of buying a new car, that is, waiting for it to be delivered, and buying a car that had been sitting in a dealers' lot would make it feel "used." If you've ever bought a Saturn, you're buying a car the Japanese way, since Saturn was created by GM as a direct experiment to implement Japanese car sales practices in the U.S. market -- enabling the car manufacturer to both make and sell the vehicle, controlling all aspects of how the cars are presented to buyers. For years I've wanted to buy a Mazda Miata, sold in Japan under the name Roadster (but due to Japanese phonetic limitations, everyone thinks it's called "Roadstar"). Last weekend we went to the local Mazda dealership and bought one, and I'm waiting for it to be delivered sometime next month. I can't wait to drive it!

My kids are kind of funny. They are half American, and we make it a point to bring them to the U.S. several times a year so they can learn about their other home country and experience the same things as American kids. They know Taco Bell, and Scooby Doo, and Cocoa Puffs, and all the normal icons of life in the U.S. But because my wife and I are busy with J-List, they spend an above-average amount of time with my wife's parents, Jiichan and Baachan (Grandpa and Grandma), who we live with in our house in Japan, and the influence of the grandparents comes through in funny ways. My kids love traditional Japanese sweets like anko (a sweet bean paste), which many Japanese kids and virtually all foreigners detest. Of course they love natto, the fermented Japanese soybeans that are the bane of most gaijin living in Japan, and they also love to munch on all kinds of Japanese rice crackers, choosing them over chocolate or other sweet foods. The blending of American and Japanese in my kids is always fun to observe.

We're extremely happy at how popular our wacky Japanese T-shirts have been. For fans of the cutest monster in all Japan, we've got a great new 100% cotton parody T-shirt featuring a "block style" version of Domo-kun. It's a very wacky design that will show your unique interest in Japan to everyone around you. Check out our wacky "MODO-kun" T-shirts, in stock now!

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, the lovely swimsuit idol Yuko Ogura is on her way to becoming the most popular cute girl in all Japan -- see her great new hardcover photobook, which comes with a cute punch-out doll of Yuko-chan for you to display
  
• For fans of cool anime toys, we've got the official Welsh Corgi toy from Cowboy Bebop, Ein, made from high-quality soft vinyl
  
• For Godzilla fans, we have a great series of trading cards from the new movie, Godzilla vs. Mothra vs Mecha Godzilla
  
• For fans of G-Taste, the famous manga and art book series by Hiroki Yagami, we've got a great new line of "trading figures" by Epoch featuring busts of his most famous characters
  
• Hello Kitty lovers, we have a great item for you: a giant heart cushion which will enhance the look of any room
  
• We've got some great new snacks for you from Japan, including more "petit snack" tubes of cookies and crackers, as well as delicious Oreo Choco and Strawberry Sticks -- yum
  
• Also a rare treat, Pocky stick snacks made with traditional Kyoto mochi rice cake, a super new twist on a famous Japanese dessert taste
  
• For a taste you don't see every day, we've got a limited edition Tohato Caramel Corn, in the very rare white chocolate flavor (yes, we're confused by it too)
  
• We've got some great chopsticks for your kitchen, nice and long for adult hands, with rough edges at the bottom to help you grip your food
  
• Got some sesame seeds? Grind them up with a great wooden pestle from Japan, also useful for many jobs in the kitchen
  
• Scoop rice with a new rice scoop we've got for you -- comes with an anti-stick coating and a handy holder
  
• We've restocked the extremely detailed Utawarerumono figures from Epoch, very detailed, with full sets in stock
  
• We sold out of the Spirit of Wonder Figure Collection toys we posted in just one day -- we've posted some random individual figures of this series while we try to get more full sets
  
• Hold your business cards stylishly with a new stainless steel name card holder from Japan
  
• We've restocked the popular Hyper Product Revolution, featuring super cute swimsuit idols like Megumi, Harumi Nemoto, Eiko Koike, Yuko Ogura and Chinatsu Wakatsuki
  
• Finally, see authentic Buddhist prayer beads, cool Hello Kitty items for your children, fresh stock of large-size bento boxes from Japan, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• For fans of Japan's adult magazines, we've got the new issue of Bachelor, filled with beautiful women from around the world, including the amazing Yulia Nova
  
• Then enjoy a great "million mook" filled with beautiful Tokyo girls aged 18-22, shot in various beautiful places all around Japan
  
• For photobook fans, we've got some great new items for you, including the beautiful glossy photobook of Iori, an amazing hardcover photobook
  
• We have some excellent new 18+ manga comics for you, featuring incredible artwork and themes, including a new offering with strong hermaphrodite concepts, beautiful cosplay art and more
  
• Also, look for another big restocking of our most popular books, including the "Excellent" anthology books, Live Wire Insertion, and the very popular Futanari Premium
  
• For doujinshi collectors, we've got another volley of excellent new books for you, parodying Japan's famous anime characters in naughty ways
  
• J-List carries unique and interesting toys for adults sold only in the Japanese market, and we've got a cool new item for men: a soft, otherworldly vibrating adult product with many potential uses, made of ultra-soft massaging micro beads
  
• For DVD collectors, we've got some great new offerings, starting with the very first "hard" performance by the lovely Mai Hagiwara, who has finally made the jump from a beautiful image idol to the professional JAV world (region free)
  
• Then taste the lovely silky stockings of Cocolo, who stars in a great new fetish offering from Atlas 21 (region free)
  
• JAV director Hajime is known for some extremely wacky ideas -- see a new collection of his best works released through Soft on Demand (region free)
  
• Also from SOD, enjoy the new Deep Kiss, this time produced by the famous Female Director Haruna, who shows her stuff with one of SOD's most famous video lines (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the very lovely Asuka Sawaguchi as she stars in a 3 hour special release by Wanz Factory, showing her most memorable performances ever -- great for fans of the amazing Japanese girl-next-door (region 2)
  
• Finally, look for some great restocked DVD products, including Photo Shot DX, Eri Yukawa's very hard DVD release, restocked Sora Aoi DVD titles, and more!
  

Remember that J-List carries the famous Japanese gum Black Black, a caffeine-laced gum that will wake up you and keep you awake. Enjoyed by everyone from college students to truck drivers, Black Black has been plugged in Wired Magazine and novels by William Gibson. And as with most of our gum and snack items, if you buy 10 or more you get a 15% discount at checkout.

Greetings from J-List February 23, 2004

Hello again from Japan!

America and Japan are very different in many ways, and the relationships between men and women reflect this. Western-style feminism never took root with Japanese women because they didn't feel it was right for them -- while women want to be protected from discrimination and 'seku-hara' (sexual harassment) in the workplace, Japanese women who actively seek lifelong professional careers are rare. While many women work as full-time OLs ("office ladies," a Japanese term for any female office worker), other jobs that are popular with women include tour guides, flight attendants/ground hostesses, and language interpreters. But the greatest job a woman can aspire to in Japan is undeniably "joshi-ana," or female newscaster (e.g. "announcer," often shortened to "ana"). All throughout Japan, many women see these educated television personalities, so beautiful and well-dressed and usually fluent in English, and sigh with envy. By unwritten Japanese rule, female newscasters nearly always marry Japanese baseball stars.

I once had an interesting experience while hitchhiking around Western Japan. I was staying at a youth hostel in Hiroshima, and there were people from all over the world staying there -- it's always fun to meet people from other countries, and youth hostels are great for that. I got into a conversation with a young Australian college student who was positively burning with the fire of American feminism, and was visiting Japan for the first time to try to awaken her "Japanese sisters" to issues of equality. A middle-aged Japanese woman who was very down-to-Earth joined our conversation, and I was trying to translate for the two women so they could share their ideas. On the one hand, the Australian girl had many logical arguments about the roles women should be able to take in a society, while at the same time the common-sense statements made by the Japanese woman were very logical, too. The bottom line is, ideas we take for granted in our own country don't necessarily work the same in other parts of the world.

When is the color blue really green? When you're in Japan. For some reason that we're not able to fathom at all, the color green is often called "blue" ("ao" or "aoi") in Japanese. When foreigners come to Japan, they learn that the color green is "midori," but when you see a green traffic light, Japanese universally describe the light as "ao" (blue). If you go to Aomori Prefecture, don't look for a "blue forest" because there isn't one, but there are plenty of green forests. When they buy fresh vegetables, Japanese say they want to find the ones that are "ichiban aoi" (lit. the most blue, e.g. the freshest). Why is this? Tomo thinks that it's because a long time ago, there was another kanji that described the color green, but it unfortunately had the same reading (pronunciation) as the normal character for blue, "ao." Through some mechanism that is beyond my comprehension, certain objects (the green of a traffic signal, the green of a leaf on a tree) are described as "ao" (blue) in Japanese, instead of "midori" (green). Like bowing to a vending machine that has just verbally thanked you for making a purchase, it's all part of the wackiness of living in Japan.

All my life I've been a fan of the Peanuts cartoons, especially the classic strips of the 50s, 60s and 70s, which I read avidly while growing up. I'm very happy to see Fanta Graphics is going to be publishing all the strips in order, starting in 1950 and going on from there, and I'll be picking them up for my collection. If you're a Peanuts fan, check these great books out. The URL is http://www.fantagraphics.com/peanuts/peanuts.html

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for fans of meticulously made anime toy replicas, we've got limited stock of a great series based on Spirit of Wonder, with full sets available
  
• Also very cool, we've got full sets of a line of capsule toys based on the timeless classic anime show, Urusei Yatsura
  
• Interested in our Japanese snacks? We've got even more for you, including cheese flavored scone snacks, "baby" potato chips and chocolate cookies, and delicious chocolate treats from Japan
  
• Also, a huge restocking of snack page items, including Milk & Hot Chocolate Pretz, Pocky "G," Tsubu Tsubu Strawberry Pocky, Pocky Decorer, winter-limited March of the Koalas, and Cheesecake Choco Ball -- yum!
  
• Looking for something extremely cute? We have Usacolle (Usagi Collection) name stickers that are self-adhesive and so cute you might just drop dead
  
• We've restocked some great anime art books including the Chobits Your Eyes Only art book
  
• From Medicom Toy, the famous maker of great toys from Japan, we've got a soft vinyl replica of Benny the Cab from Roger Rabbit
  
• Then for fans of the original 1966 Ultraman (like me), we've got a very detailed toy replicas of the Science Special Search Party VTOL airship, one of the coolest toys we've seen
  
• Show how Japanese you are by giving Japanese "stick sugar" to your guests -- we've got this uniquely Japanese item in stock now
  
• We've got other wacky items for you too, including a cute door sign that lets you tell others when you're studying, "having a guest" or "out of door"
  
• The Diablock block figures from Japan combine stylish Japanese design with the cute block figure style you know -- we've got cute character keychains in stock for you
  
• We've got a neat item that my own kids love: rulers with swirling wheels inside to make amazing designs
  
• Finally, look for more wacky Japanese stickers, more wacky erasers in cute shapes, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• First, we've got the MPEG Indies DVD, featuring a full color magazine and DVD with 4 hours of great sample movies for you
  
• For fans of the lovely Yoko Mitsuya, one of our favorite sexy idols, we have her new magazine release, with all pages dedicated to this lovely woman
  
• For fans of Japan's beautiful glossy photobooks, enjoy the beautiful body (and 99 cm bust) of Haruka Tanabe in her new offering
  
• Then enjoy the incredible beauty of Yua Aida in her very first shy photobook release for you
  
• We have many restocked photobooks too, including Micro Mini stocking lovers' photobook, Aki Hoshino's best-selling hardcover photobook, and more copies of the huge hit product On Location with Mai Hagiwara
  
• We've also got some excellent 18+ manga for you, including "Please be quiet while the doctor is examining you," a superb new hermaphroditism book, a great anthology of classic manga stories and more
  
• Also, we've restocked some excellent manga comics for you, including the Pururun Princess series, Memories of Pink, the Urushihara's amazing Dark Crimson
  
• Doujinshi collectors, we've got another bunch of all-new books for you, but check them before they sell out
  
• Also, we've restocked the extremely cool Youhei Kozou CG collections vol. 1 & 2
  
• For our DVD collectors, we've got more excellent titles from japan, starting with the debut DVD of the "absolute beauty," Karen Kisaragi (region free)
  
• Then enjoy excellent performances by girls from Northern Europe, in a great release by Wild Side (region free)
  
• Visit the "Planet of the Lustful Women" in a bold release from Dash, featuring tekoki and other Japanese fetishes (region free)
  
• Then witness the delightful Watermelon Breast Newscaster starring Kyoko Ayana, a super new title from Princess that you won't want to miss (region free)
  
• Then see more bizarre study of human genitalia fetish, brought to you by Moodyz (region 2)
  
• Then see a great new performance by 100% Tokyo Natural Girls, in a new DVD release by Wanz Factory (region 2)
  
• Finally, we've restocked another dozen or so popular DVD titles for you, so check out our selection!
  

Remember that J-List carries excellent magazine by our "reserve subscription." This means that you can get great anime, JPOP, fashion and other magazines sent to you as soon as the new issue is out in Japan -- a few days earlier than newsstands receive them here, in fact. Japanese anime magazines like Newtype Japan, street fashion magazines like FRUiTs, and the incredible Megami Magazine, filled with posters and cards in each issue -- all are available from us each month. Payment through any method is fine (credit card, check or money order) and you can stop your subscription at any time.

Greetings from J-List February 20, 2004

Hello again from all of us at J-List!

Rice is the staple food of Japan, and it's eaten pretty much two or three times a day by most Japanese. Japanese usually eat white rice, steamed in electric rice cookers that are owned by virtually every household (we have two or three in our house). Rice is usually eaten as a side dish to other foods (hamburger steak, sashimi, salmon, etc.), and the food you eat as a main course along with your rice is called "okazu." Supposedly, the idea of eating a small amount of a main dish with a lot of rice comes from Japan's wartime past, when everyone was poor and had very little to eat except rice. The best rice in Japan comes from Niigata Prefecture, on the Sea of Japan side of the country (the Snow Country in Kawabata's famous novel). It's called Koshi-Hikari, and restaurants proudly boast of serving only this type of rice to their customers. The Japanese have a couple of different words for rice, depending on what form it's in. "Genmai" refers to rice in its natural state, and "kome" (KOH-meh) is processed, uncooked white rice. Rice in its cooked form is "gohan," and this word is also used to refer to all food, not just rice. Similarly, "sake" refers to all alcoholic beverages, not just sake.

The fact that Japanese love to eat so much rice is the probable reason so many Japanese women seem to have problems with constipation -- after all, rice is supposed to firm up your stool, and they eat it every day. One report I saw on TV here said that 47% of Japanese high school girls and 57% of career women report problems with constipation ("benpi" in Japanese, in case it ever comes up in Trivial Pursuit). The high rate of constipation can cause other health problems including a tendency towards some cancers, and women have even been known to die when their intestines ruptured from an accumulation of waste products. Rice is very important to the Japanese, but perhaps some of them should consider eating less?

It's been said that South Korea is "the nearest country and yet the farthest away" from Japan. Despite being extremely close to one another geographically and genetically, and despite billions of dollars of trade flowing across the Sea of Japan (the Koreans hate that name by the way), it's often amazing how little understanding there is about customs on both sides of the water. Over the past few years, though, there've been real steps at meaningful cultural exchange between Japan and South Korea, helped in part by the co-hosting of the 2002 World Cup. Many Koreans such as KPOP singer BoA and actress Yoon Son Ha are regular faces on Japanese TV, and as of January, a ban on Japanese culture in Korea has been lifted, allowing Japanese music and other forms of culture to be sold in Korea. We hope for lots of happy interchange between the two countries now and in the future.

At J-List, we really believe that Japan's interactive dating-sim games are great, and so we carry virtually every English-translated game available in our San Diego warehouse for your convenience. We're happy to announce the next great game to be released: G-Collections' new Heart de Roommate, in which you play Yusuke, a boy who finds yourself living in a girls' dorm with some very beautiful female roommates. A innovative new dating-sim game for Windows computers, the story is divided into 26 anime-style episodes, complete with opening credits, "eyecatch" breaks before commercials and more. In stock and ready to ship out to you right away!

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for all who love Totoro, we've added some high-quality plush toys from Sun Arrow, Japan's famous maker of toys for nearly 100 years
  
• Also, a major restocking of popular Totoro and Studio Ghibli items, including the Knitting Bou Nezumi from Spirited Away, the Totoro Soot Sprite keychain and more
  
• For fans of our delicious Japanese snacks, we've added many new items for you, including Indian Chai flavored chocolate snacks (wow!), Barbecue flavored "scone" snacks, and some delicious Japanese potato chip and sesame munchies
  
• Domo-kun fans, we've restocked the super large Domo-kun stuffed plush, the largest Domo they ever made!
  
• From Medicom Toy, we've got a deluxe set of six detailed Kubrick figures from Dragon Head, the popular anime and manga, a fabulous item for collectors
  
• Also for fans of unique Japanese toys, we've got a set of six classic steam locomotives from Japan's golden years, a great item for trainophiles all over the world
  
• We've got a great new Tomica die-cast metal car in stock, the Nissan Cima, sold in the U.S. as the Infinity Q45
  
• For Hello Kitty fans, we have a great form-fitting pillow which will make sleeping more comfortable, and make it fun to sleep with Kitty
  
• We've got more wacky Japanese folding fans that are very traditional and nice to look at
  
• We've added more stock of the popular Japanese brush pens which let you write flowing Japanese calligraphy
  
• For sushi fans, we've got some handy "temaki" sets which allow you to make rolled-type sushi easily
  
• J-List carries unique DVDs from Japan, and we've added stock of My Neighbor Totoro (the official Ghibli release with full subtitles and many extras) as well as OH! Mikey vol. 4 (both region 2)
  
• For all students of Japanese (or just about any other subject), we've gotten in more stock of the Zebra Check Set study aids, which help you memorize any information, the way the Japanese do
  
• Finally, we've got wacky Japanese stamps, more music boxes for anime collectors, fresh stock of the deluxe 120 cm loose socks, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• First, check out the new Monthly Chisato Morishita, featuring amazing photos of one of Japan's most beautiful ladies
  
• Then see limited stock of some popular magazines, including more items posted starting at just $5
  
• We love Japan's tradition of leg fetish photography, and we've added a new photobook for you
  
• Then enjoy the delightful swimsuit photos of Izumi Yokoyama, an amazing Race Queen popular in Japan now
  
• Also, a superb offering with Hikari Kisugi and Kirari Koizumi, two very special Japanese idols
  
• For 18+ manga fans, we've added some great new comics, including the newest Maya Miyazaki Presents, cute cosplay manga, and a dynamite work by Hidemi Amano
  
• Also, we've restocked several popular manga for you, including Blue Eyes (all volumes)
  
• We've got more excellent doujinshi for you to check out, including amateur comics based on Bluer than Indigo, Sakura Wars and more
  
• For yaoi fans, we've added a great new manga for you too -- Aim For My Heart and Let's Fall in Love
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some excellent new items for you, starting with The Stewardess Best 4 Hours, 240 minutes of all-stewardess action (region free)
  
• Sola Aoi, aka Sora Aoi, is one of our all-time favorites in the JAV world -- see her in a new release that features mult-angle features (region free)
  
• From SOD, enjoy the "pure select" performances of stars like Ai Kurosawa, Kokoro Amano and Kyoko Ayana in a great new best-hits release (region free)
  
• For fans of girl-on-girl action, we have a new release by Soft on Demand in which girls must battle other girls, with sexy results (region free)
  
• We've loved Akira Watase ever since she appeared on the JAV scene some years ago -- see her in a bold new release from Wanz Factory with some of her best performances ever (region free)
  
• Then from Moodyz, enjoy a wonderful new release starring Manami Suzuki in a beautiful tropical land
  
• Finally, look for a big update to our DVD stock, including Anna Ohura's DVD works, Stars!! with Monoka (sigh...), more 4-hour DVDs full of the best girl-girl performances you can find, and more!
  

Remember that J-List offers automatic discounts on many items that we make available. Looking for some DVDs? Get 4 or more and get an automatic 15% off. Looking for some Japanese dating-sim games? Buy 4 or more and get a great bit 20% discount. Some of our wacky Japanese T-shirts with messages like "I'm looking for a Japanese Girlfriend"? Get 3 or more and get a 10% discount. All discounts are automatic at time of checkout.

Greetings from J-List February 18, 2004

Hello from J-List! Spring is beginning to spring here in Japan, a time that's called Haru Ichiban in Japanese. On the Kanto plain that means strong, dusty winds blowing everywhere, as high pressure and low pressure zones fight it out for control of the country. It's windy outside, but at least it's getting warmer.

People and customs can vary quite a lot from place to place. In America, we try to respect individuality, and the concept that everyone is unique and special is seen as a positive one. But in Japan, the dynamics of how groups function tend to make people less interested in being seen as unique or special by the in-group at large. I like to consider my own life to be quite unique -- I'm an American who's been lucky enough to live in Japan for the past 13 years and evangelize Japanese pop culture to many great people all around the world. I also lived in New Zealand for a year when I was a boy, and am one of the few Yanks in the world who can recite Fred Dagg comedy monologues. I had a Japanese friend who was very different from "average" Japanese in many ways, yet when I pointed this out to her once she said, "No, I'm just a normal, average Japanese." My friend actively wanted to be thought of as normal (in Japanese: futsuu) and not different (kawatteru) from the norm, and my compliment that she was "unique" actually upset her.

In the course of my adult life I've read most of James Clavell's books on Asia and Japan. While his historically-based novels are interesting, I've always had a problem with his Japanese characters who are finely attuned to such concepts as giri (duty, honor, obligation) and ninjo (lit. human feeling, e.g. the moral tradition of giving up something for others) and other flowery concepts that didn't seem to mesh with modern Japan. I've never met a Japanese who was ready to commit seppuku, although James Clavell's characters always seem ready to disembowel themselves at a moment's notice to defend their honor. I have observed, however, that most Japanese do practice real filial piety, that is, showing respect to their parents and making decisions that take their parents wishes into account. For example, while Americans usually leave home in their late teens or early twenties and never live with their parents again, it's customary for the oldest son or daughter to stay at home permanently, taking over the family business (if there is one) and maintaining the house as the central hub for the rest of the family members. When that person gets married, their wife or husband will come live with them in their parents house, in effect being legally adopted by that family. When my father-in-law married my wife's mother, he came to live at our house, taking his wife's last name and taking over the family liquor shop. I also joined their household, although I kept my own last name. A bit of trivia for you: a man who lives with his wife's parents but doesn't take their last name is called a Masuo (mah-SOO-oh), named after the husband in the long-running anime show Sazae-san. If you want to surprise Japanese friends, pull this bit of knowledge out and watch their jaws hit the floor that a foreigner would know something like this.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for anyone wanting to study Japanese, we've got some useful items: kanji workbooks for Japanese students that are great for anyone trying to master written Japanese
  
• Also, workbooks for practicing writing of hiragana, katakana and kanji, and more fun word cards in stock
  
• And for any serious student of Japanese, we're happy to have the new Canon Wordtank IDF-3000, featuring four complete dictionaries inside an easy to use electronic unit -- features full English menus and manual
  
• Hello Kitty collectors, we've got some really cool items for you today, including plush Kitty hand towel sets for your bathroom
  
• Also, fresh stock of the Hello Kitty USB hub, the excellent Kitty diary, and other cool items
  
• Check out our unique Japanese snack items, including sour ume gummi treats, chocolate covered pumpkin seeds, tasty senbei crackers, and a great new kind of hard candy that's really fun to eat
  
• Also, restocked traditional snacks like kneading candy (semi-liquid candy you mix with chopsticks) and the delicious "bubble ball" fizzing candy
  
• For fans of our wacky things from Japan, enjoy train maps of the Tokyo and Osaka area, great for your wall
  
• For fans of Shirow Masamune's amazing works, we've got vol. 1 of the very hard to find Jashin Hunter (Demon Hunter) illustrated novel back in stock -- but our current stock will be the last available
  
• For Gundam fans, we've got the new Haro Capsule Toy series, featuring really cool PVC toys of Gundam characters in Haro-styled capsules
  
• By request, we've restocked the popular fude-pen brush pens, which write like a Chinese writing brush
  
• Look for some really amazing wood-cut chopsticks, perfect for putting out when guests come over to eat
  
• Promote health in your mouth with "tongue cleaners," which are shaped so that you can easily brush your tongue just like you brush your teeth to remove plaque
  
• We've got some very stylish block-toy style toys from Japan similar to Lego, which you can attach to your phone or keychain
  
• For women who want to restore the pinkness of their nipples (something Japanese women are concerned about apparently), we've restocked the popular Chikubina pinkening cream
  
• We've done a major restocking of many Totoro and Studio Ghibli toys, including several Totoro plush toys, Soot Sprite plushes, the Totoro and Jiji knapsacks, the Spirited Away plush Collection, and the Fox Squirrel from Lapura and Nausica
  
• Also, an item we're proud to be able to make available to you, the giant Totoro Cuckoo Clock, a truly amazing item for your home
  
• Finally, look for many other great items from Japan, including the Cup Noodle coffee cup (a favorite of mine), new ways to make sushi and gyoza in your home, a sunny side up egg maker, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• First, we have two excellent new issues of Penthouse Japan and Penthouse Special, wonderful magazines produced entirely in Japan and featuring Japanese models and aesthetic sensibilities
  
• We've got the new issue of Do-Up!, the super sexy magazine featuring real Japanese girls off the street
  
• For fans of Manami Suzuki, the delightful former Race Queen turned video idol, we've got a magazine with DVD of her best works (region 2)
  
• Also for DVD fans, we've got a great 5 hour magazine and sampler DVD item, the new DVD Dash (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the delightful nude of Emi Kitagawa in her amazing new photobook release
  
• Also, the amazing sexy photobook of Natsuki Katoh, featuring many artistically beautiful photos
  
• For 18+ manga fans, we've got some excellent new works for you, including The Bandage Man and Ryoh-Yuuki's amazing Love Mix
  
• Also, we've restocked many manga volumes for you, including Punky Knight, P-Total Bio Chemical Lab, Refrection, and all four volumes of the popular Female Panther
  
• For doujinshi fans, we've got another selection of top-quality comics posted, with some amazing new parody anime releases for you
  
• Also, yaoi fans, enjoy a big restock of popular books too, including the Muscle Man series
  
• We've restocked the beautiful Libido 7 DVD Visual Works art book too, for collectors of Japan's dating-sim games
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some great items for you, starting with a fantastic *8 hours* of the "Ero Best" of Big Morkal, an amazing feat by one of Japan's top professional studios (region free)
  
• Then see the best girls from Hungary in another bold "Japanese actors vs European gals" release from Wild Side (region free)
  
• Then catch a wild trio of performances by Ai Kurosawa, Mai Haruna and Miyuki Hourai in a massive 2-DVD set from Soft on Demand (region free)
  
• Ami Ayukawa has debuted in the indies world, allowing this amazing angel to really shine at her best -- see a great new release from her through Wanz Factory (region 2)
  
• Then for fans of the luscious Kyoko Ayana, a fantastic treat: a great new DVD from Moodyz which comes with a latex toy that was molded from Kyoko's own body (region 2)
  
• Finally, look for some great new DVDs in stock, including Dream Woman Best 4 Hours, a bizarre sports festival from Moodyz, more "black men vs Japanese girls" titles, Akira Watase's parody of the Mini-Suka Police, and more!
  

Remember that J-List carries many cute items for your kitchen, including bento boxes and accessories, Japanese chopsticks (both basic ones for general use and cute chopsticks), sushi and onigiri molds, wacky Japanse kitchen containers, and more. Please check out the "Kitchen and Bento" section of the Wacky Things from Japan page!

Greetings from J-List February 11, 2004

Hello again from all your friends at J-List!

A big change is coming to Japan: the end of gyudon as we know it. One of the most popular fast foods here, gyudon (beef bowl, e.g. steamed beef and onions on white rice) is a staple of Japanese men, because it's cheap and filling. Because of the mad cow scare in the U.S. and subsequent banning of U.S. beef in Japan, all national beef bowl chains such as Yoshinoya have been forced to cease selling their flagship product, trying to coax customers with alternate foods instead, like curry, pork bowl or katsudon (a fried pork cutlet on white rice, with sauce smothered over it). McDonald's Japan is fervently advertising the fact that it uses only Australian beef, appealing to parents who are concerned about the safety of their food.

The Japanese do love to play with the English language in creative ways, often resulting in some bizarre concoctions. The main use of English in Japan is decorative, and English isn't meant to communicate anything meaningful -- thus it's not really an issue if the words on the can of beer you're drinking sound a little funny. The Japanese feel that English is very positive and direct, not vague in meaning like their own language can be. Often, positive English words finds their way into the names of products or companies, like Cook-Do! (instant Chinese food), Farm-Do! (a farm supply retailer), I'll (travel agency), Will (the name of a bishoujo game company, and a car from Toyota), and Fappy ("the fax machine that makes you happy" by Sharp). Just as the Swiss accidentally hit upon the name Swatch for their Swiss watches because the designers didn't speak enough English to know that the word sounded a little strange, the Japanese have used creative English to their advantage, coming up with terms like Re-House (a company that remodels homes), nice middy (a happy, carefree term for a middle-aged woman, designed to make them feel good about their age so they'll travel more), and Toyota's popular small car Fun! Car! Go!

J-List is the only official source for Yulia Nova merchandise outside of Japan, because of our special relationship with the photographer who discovered the beautiful Russian model. We're happy to announce that we've completed a licensing agreement that will allow us to bring Yulia products to fans around the world, and at great prices. The prices of the upcoming U.S. release Yulia Nova DVDs, vol. 1-3, has been lowered to $40, allowing many more fans of Yulia to buy her products and support the creation of future DVDs. If you preordered the DVDs, you'll be getting them at the lower price. If you haven't ordered them yet, why not preorder them now? They're scheduled to ship in March 2004.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you, described below. To view all products updated in the past 3 days, click: http://www.jlist.com/UPDATES/PG/3/

• First, for fans of really excellent anime-style edge art, we've got the fantastic art book of Toshiyuki Tanaka, which will blow your mind
  
• For fans of really wacky and excellent Vermillion Pleasure Nights, the late-night Japanese television show which spawned OH! Mikey, we've got the last two volumes, featuring amazing and bizarre short films from Japan's best young directors
  
• We've got some great snack items for you today, including Fujiya's Strawberry Shortcake snacks (yum), Chelsea toffees, tasty strawberry-chocolate sticks, and a bizarre new flavor of Shigekix, the super-tart "hard gummy" from Japan
  
• Wealso stock many varieties of Japanese chewing gum, and we've restocked these today for you
  
• Also back in stock -- many varieties of Japanese "minty" eyedrops, which wake you up and keep you alert all day
  
• We've also restocked several popular Japanese treats, including Pocari Sweat powder, Choco Ball Peanuts, and Pretz sticks flavored like traditional Tonkotsu Ramen (a famous food from Kyushu)
  
• The Japanese are fond of collecting bizarre erasers of all shapes and sizes -- we've gotten in some funny parody food erasers for you today
  
• We love the anime show Please Teacher -- now Kotobukiya has issued a set of "One Coin Figures" of the females from this show, and we've got full sets in stock for you!
  
• Look for various manga in stock, too, including the original Please Teacher mangas sets, Chobits bilingual comics vol 1, the really popular Ghost in the Shell bilingual manga and more
  
• We'verestocked our traditional Japanese hot springs bath powder, which lets you sample many famous hot springs around Japan
  
• Licca-chan is the super cute fashion doll from Takara, the anti-Barbie since she's demure, cute and girlish. We have a limited "Idol Licca" set of three dolls in stock today
  
• We carry all the Japan-market Hot Wheels vehicles, and we've restocked several varieties for you, including the Thunderbirds, Stingray and other great cars
  
• Finally, check out a giant puffy dice (great for playing giant games of Axis & Allies), more of the popular lighted ear cleaners, healthy masks to keep your germs from spreading, and more!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. To view all new products, click this link: http://www.jlist.com/UPDATES/R/3/

• We have the new issue of Dela Beppin, filled with beautiful JAV stars from Japan including Yoko Kumada
  
• Thenenjoy the new issue of Yo! featuring fantastic Tokyo girls in love hotels
  
• Enjoy the new issue if Hip & Lip, a beautiful hybrid magazine that combines hentai manga and beautiful models in an interesting mix
  
• Fans of Japan's photobooks, we've got the beautiful hardcover offering of Kumiko Akiyoshi's beautiful body
  
• Thensee the most beautiful bikini idols in Japan in Young Magazine Bikinies, a great photobook featuring the sexiest swimsuit idols in Japan
  
• Then we have another treat, a great glossy photobook of Chinatsu Watatsuki, one of my personal faves
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got several new books posted for you, including the elegant Trap by Action Comics, Dynamite Miko by Tenma Comics and more
  
• Also, a big restocking of popular books, including the Blue Eyes series, Fetish Doll, Dark Crimson, and several best-selling hermaphrodite themed comics
  
• For doujinshi enthusiasts, we've got more authentic doujinshi books from Japan, featuring super H parody of your favorite anime characters
  
• AG is the magazine of "art, sex and CG culture," and it's the best source of English-translated 18+ manga in the U.S. -- we've restocked several issues of this popular book, including the last stock we'll be getting of volume 2
  
• DVD fans, we've got some great new additions for you, starting with the newest performance by the pure and lovely Akiho Yoshizawa, released by Samantha (region free)
  
• For fans of the sly and sexy Ran Asakawa, see her best works from Dogma, in a great compilation disc for you (region free)
  
• Explore the world of female self-pleasuring in a new disc from Soft on Demand, a great new Magic Mirror Bus production shot in their go-anywhere studio (region free)
  
• From SOD's Deep's label, enjoy the Best Selection of their works of 2003,a whopping 4 hours of material presented for you to peruse (region free)
  
• Then from Waap Entertainment, we've got the new Dream Shower release featuring the performance of Miho Suzuki, in a great bukkake work for you (region 2)
  
• Finally, restocked DVD titles include Asuka Sawaguchi's popular VIP Shower, Ami Hinata's Semen Club, more Japanese Pro Wrestling for grown-ups and more!
  

Are you a big guy? Then you're in luck! J-List makes many wacky Japanese T-shirts, and we're always closing out old designs to make room for new shirts. We're down to the last few of several of our close-out T-shirts, and most of the shirts in stock are XXL or XXXL. If you're on the large side, you can take advantage of the big discounts for these close-out items and save.

Remember that J-List stocks virtually every English-language Japanese dating-sim game available, with great games from Peach Princess, G-Collections, Hobibox, and JAST USA. These story-based interactive games allow you to interact with beautiful anime girls in a multi-path game story, and try to win their hearts. If you're interested in these great games but don't know which would be good, feel free to ask us for recommendations!